I've got to tell you the story about how I loved the song "Triste Yu.'"

And I loved it so much that I asked Frank when I was recording "Todu I Tiempo" I said, "Frank, I really love that song, can I--can I record it?"

And he said, "No.

I'm going to do something better."

On the spot, Frank Bokonggo Pangelinan, wrote "Magof Yu'."

Magof Yu' Ti puti kurason-hu "Magof Yu'" means I am happy because-- basically it's a turnaround.

It's like a healing of a relationship.

And I've had so many people come up to me and say, when they listen to that song it has healed their marriages, or their coupleness or their relationships.

I love the fact that it sounds like the ocean.

I love the ocean.

I'm a Malesso' girl.

I love the ocean.

I love the sand.

I love the sea.

And that's just for me, an embellishment of what what Guam is about.

Malesso' is just such a wonderful place.

I grew up there with my my parents, of course, and my grandparents.

I grew up and I took turns staying at their houses becaus I was the first granddaughter.

My father was a policeman here in Sinahånña, and then my grandmother was a techa, so it was our responsibility to open the church.

As a matter of fact, I remember going to the Nobenas with her and she would teach m how to pray and sing in CHamoru and that was part of what I grew up with.

I puti'on i chatangmak fumanu'i yu My grandfather was the- the carpenter for the church.

And he would be the ones- be the one building all the the different area of the church that needed help.

And as they were doing tha they would sing the Kantan Chamo where they're throwing the verses to each other.

I remember sometimes in inclement weather, we would hang clothes in the bodega people would play the guitar and sing their songs.

That's how I became familiar with "I Puti'on."

i puti'on i chatangmak fumanu'i yu nu hågu neni na That's basically how we started just being in tune to music and being introduced to it.

So that's a very fond memory.

Those were were some of the wonderful times that kind of stay with you in your memories that help you appreciate the transition in our lives these days.

Ga nakko didide nu hågu Singing was jus an evolutionary part of my life.

yanggen atrasao kontra ta para ta sena The first time that I wa formally introduced into singing when I was asked by my neighbor- asked me if I would consider si at this island-wide 4-H competit And the reason why I wanted to do it was there were stories about how they would fry spam and sausages and eggs, and I wanted that experience.

So I said, "Sure!

I'll go and I'll sing for the 4-H Jamboree."

Ga nakko didide nu hågu At the time when I was going to St Jude, there were a group of us that liked to sing.

We get together and play the piano and just learn to harmonize songs.

So we were called the "Judettes" because we were from St.

Jude and then some of us, when we moved to the Academy, we started to just play the guitar, sing... Then at the time, Father Joe San Agustin would teach us these songs.

Honestly, that I think that's how the song-fest for the-- for the Academy started.

Matto yu' gi gima ya hu sodda hao Fortunately for me, I had two male cousins that were in a band called The High Tones.

My older cousin Frankie Martinez, and then his brother, who was the manager, Peling.

Peling and Frankie would ask me to sing.

I would be picked up to go t these parties, birthday parties, weddings, baptismals.

So that was like a continuous practice.

I'd go and rehearse with the ban and just--just have fun during the weekend.

That's how I use my talent.

If I were to give advice to my younger self, I would just say, "Have fun.

Live life.

You don't have to be s conservative, but just have fun.

Let go."

My first experience recording was very, very funny, very, very unorthodox.

Thank God my family was helping me with babysitting the kids because there were time when we would stay at the studio 'til three in the morning.

And at that time they didn't have the digital equipment that they now have.

We just had the old fashioned ke and the way you mixed it was the way it was going to sound in the recording.

There were times it was just gre the first two or three takes, and then there were times where had to go back over and over because the band members couldn' that it sounded okay.

But we finally got the album done and it was such a great experience and I really thank Johnny Sablan for the Casamiento album, The Charfauros Brothers for the-- the big album that has all my ten songs there.

And then, of course, Tommy Bejado, who's really been a brother.

What I really liked about th music scene of the time is that for those of us who spoke CHamor we really spoke the hardcore CHamoru language.

Fanohge hulu ya in fanbanidosu It was an amazing time because you could see we were coming off the security mandate being lifte So we were trying to project music that would attract people to Guam.

We were told at one of the tourist gatherings that were for one of the hotels that we needed to show a little more like we needed to be more like Hawaii.

And some of us kind of protested because we didn't think that was We were all trying to promote the culture in the most authentic form of the language.

Y CHamoru Y CHamoru Y CHamoru Y CHamoru Y CHamoru Y CHamoru Manmetgot yan bråbu For those that want to to perpetuate their music, I think is what's important is letting people know that this is your music.

This is the type of genre that you have, whether you're a male or female, just to be yourself.

Respect yourself, love yourself, give what you can.

But also allow yourself to take care of yourself before you take care of anybody else.

Manmetgot yan bråbu I never really seriously thought about singing as a gift.

I just thought it was something that I could share and the opportunities were always there.

I primet na matago-ña I haiguas para... The idea is to embellish the joy that people feel when you share that gift of singing and most especially when they're they're sharing it with you when they're singing with you.

Sirena, dispensa yu' haga-hu I've had the opportunity to be invited as a guest performer with Inetnon Gefpå'go which I thoroughly enjoyed and I sang my song Sirena, and they danced to in the backgr And I didn't realize that, that it's on YouTube.

And so that now has-- it's perpetuated throughout the for those that want to listen.

So that's a gift in itsel just to be able to share that.

I know that certain groups have been doing covers of my song "Hågu" and some of the other songs, which I love.

Hågu ni' ti hu nanangga My song "Hågu was written by my sister Janice and it's really a song about unrequited love.

She wrote that song because she had a crush on one of her classmates at school, and to this day, that person never found out that that song was about him.

What's beautiful about the son is that it's a universal song.

It touches my heart that so many people want to rerecord it and sing it.

Fanhongge nu guåhu sa' guåhu hongge hao I love the fact the younger people are not thinking, "Oh, that's old, old stuff, old news."

I love the fact that they're being creative about it.

Hågu ni' ti hu nanangga You bring sunshine to my eyes Hågu mu na'gaisabot lina'la-hu Hågu fuma'nå'gue manguifi ta'l You know, if you love to sing.

Just sing.

Turn the radio on, sing, play some kind of music.

Because music is such a beautifu especially for teenager going through a transitional tim or for anybody for that matter.

Write what you're feeling.

And you can eventually turn it into music.

You just never know.

You impact people whether you want to or not.

Find the beauty, find the love in in what you're doing.

Hågu The toughest part of my musical career was during one of my performances.

My children at the time were going to school and they were waiting to be picked up.

All four of them.

And for me that was a breaking point.

Kahulo' i pilan Ma'lak yan klåru I had to choose between my career as a musician, as a professional musician, and being the mother.

They needed my time, they needed my love, they needed my attention.

And I didn't need to be all over the place.

People don't know this, but this is my-- this is my belief, this is my philosophy.

You're going to perfor and you're going to perform well for every hour that you are on that stage.

You need 24 hours of rehearsal, whether it's your music your choreography, your script.

You just need to be disciplined enough to say, "Okay, the one hour tha I'm going to give to the public I'm going to practice 24 hours, even if it's just an hour a day."

And I couldn't--I wasn't i a position to do that anymore.

Yan fatto tatte In this day and age, we forget that the mother, the wife is really the heart of the family.

And we have to allow our significant other to be the head--to be the head of the household.

That's how my grandmother, my grandmothers taught me.

That's how my mother taught me, and that's how I continue to try to teach my children.

My focus had to shift to being the mother.

Being the wife, being the nurturer of my household.

But you have to have a sense of balance and only you can create that balance.

And for me, I had to-- I had to basically focus on what was most important.

I was nurturing my four children.

I needed to be there for them, be there when it's time to pick them up.

Be there to feed them be there to put them to bed in t Priority for me is family Has always been and will always Sa' mañodda yu' otro When I was asked to join the Miss Guam Beauty Pageant, I'll never forget Mrs.

Clementi and Mrs.

Souder would come to my and I would hide in the bathroom Because I just thought I would not meet the criteria of being an international beauty queen.

One, I love to swim.

That's being part of the Malesso' girl.

I love to swim.

And my dad used to tease me because I became so dark.

I went from chocolate to fudge.

I just think there was no wa I was going to make Miss Guam.

I was going to be competin with all these beautiful, tall, half Caucasian, half CHamoru type women.

And when they finally convinced I don't know what it wa that convinced me to finally joi I said, "Okay."

And one of the contestants, her name was Hilary Best.

She became Miss Universe.

And I remember her asking me one time, she said, "Have you ever been anywhere out of Guam?"

I said, "No.

My concept of vast and huge was looking out at the ocean where the sky met the ocean.

That to me was vast.

That was huge."

And so she told me in a very loving way, She said, "You know, I hope you win so you get a chance to get out of Guam."

I didn't think anything of it.

I just went to slee and didn't think anything of it.

So at that time, they were building the Citibank office.

And the panel of judges asked me what was being built.

And I really attribute my love for reading the paper and for anything to my parents c one of the things that my paren had stressed was academics.

One of the things that come with academic excellence is of c reading and being aware of your surroundings.

When I was asked by the panel of what building was being built, they were surprised that I knew the answer.

And then the other thing that I was asked to do is to accompany myself and to sing a song.

So the only song I remembered was "Leaving on a Jet Plane."

I think all of that combined helped me garner the title of being Miss Asia, and I've not really told this to anybody.

My mother had a dream that I would become an international beauty queen when I was younger, and she never really told me until after the fact.

And I also had that drea a year before I acquired the tit In today's world, we just become so busy.

It's like we're trying so hard to be a part of somebody's agenda but it's so important to just be There's a saying that I really love, and I've shared it with so many people.

You know happiness is like a butterfly.

When you chase it and chase it, it eludes you.

But if you sit quietly, it comes and rests softly on your shoulders.

So that's important.

Take the time to just be quiet, appreciate where you are an what you've been blessed with.

I was very, very blessed not on the Mercy Sisters, the Capuchin but also the Franciscan sisters.

And I had one teacher.

She was my second grade teacher.

I'll never forget her.

Her name was Sister Optara.

And it's because of her that I truly believe in guardian angels And I'll never forget how she told me about how you always have your guardian an to the point where sometimes I' a little space for my guardian a And up to now even like for parking spaces I'll pray to my guardian angel to find me a parking space.

But Sister Optara was one of those teachers that that would give you these pithy or these sayings that you rememb And one of these sayings was a poem that I learned to memoriz and I share as often as I can.

And it goes like this "Through this tiresome world alas once and only once I pass.

If a kindness I may do, if a good deed, I may show let me do it while I can.

No delay for it is plain I shall never pass this way again."

And I attribute that to Sister Optara.

I have a very strong love for our blessed mother because as the mother of Jesus, she embodies the things that I really appreciate.

You know, there's a prayer that I'll never forget.

And the Blessed Mother says, Give me your silence.

Give me your confidence, give me your prayer.

And I think it's so important in this day and age, you know, not to have to be like the crazy policeman on the corne where nobody's paying attention and he's got his arms all over the place.

I'd kind of like to be the kind of person who, when I walk into the room in a quiet way, in a quiet, humble way, that people know I'm there and that my presence means something to them.

Hopefully something positive.

What inspires me today is a sense of well-being, not just physically, but also mentally, emotionally, and most importantly, having a sense of balance.

You know, we can't be everything for everybody.

What's important is just being yourself and being who you are in the moment and enjoying it.

Nuebu nasion-ta You know, one of the things I really love about the people of Guam and Micronesia is that we really have a good sense of hearing.

And it's part of being Austrones It's part of having the gift of seeing the ocean and the way the palm trees move.

You know, that kind of gives u a sense of rhythm, a sense of be We have that gift than a lot of throughout the world.

That makes us attractive.

You know, it's not just the actual movement.

It's the heart, it's the mind; all combined.

Ai Guåhan, Nuebu nasion-ta I just want people to know that I'm me, a child of God, that's just allowed the graces and the blessings to give and to give wherever she can.

And hopefully someday there'll be thousands more Flora Baza Quans singing Hågu and loving people and respecting the land and just enjoying life.

And most importantly, having a very strong love for Go and the Blessed Mother and the Guardian Angels.

Because what makes me important what makes me important in God's is that what I do hopefully will bring others closer to him.

Hu guiaya hao Hu guiaya hao Means I love you with all my heart and I hope we'll never part.

Cause you were meant for me and me for you Pues håfa bai hu cho'gue yanggen hu guaiya hao.

Ai neni u diseseha mohon na un guaiya yu kurason ya hågu neni nai malago'-hu.

Oh island in the sun built to me by my father's hands All my days I will sing and pr your forests, waters, your shi This is our island in the sun where our people have toiled since time begun Well, I've been to a many sea but this will always be home t Well now.

Oh island in the sun, built to me by my father's han All my days I will sing and pr your forests, waters, your shi Munga yu' ma fino' Inglisi enao håfa hinasso-mu.

Malago hao umotro klasi lao CHamoru i rasa-mu.

Si nana-mu sen CHamoru Si tata-mu tuma'lo Håfa na para un Amerikano Kao o'son hao nu hågu I palabra an un pronunsia un usa i bariya.

Nisisita un ripåra palao'an håyi un kekefa'baba.

Munga yu' ma fino' Inglisi enao håfa hinasso-mu.

Malago hao umotro klasi lao CHamoru i rasa-mu.

Lao CHamoru i rasa-mu.

CHamoru hao!

Thank you.

Thank you.

Si Yu'us Ma'ase.